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Post by DEERTRACKS on Apr 19, 2007 5:49:31 GMT -5
Donald E. Wildmon
Founder and Chairman
April 18, 2007
U.S. House set to vote on “Grassroots Gag Order”
Contact your representative today to oppose H.R. 984.
Without a doubt, this could be the most important letter I have written you. I wrote to you in January about legislation in the U.S. Senate that could have silenced grassroots communication. Thankfully, the legislation was defeated after you and other concerned citizens let your voices be heard. Now, the U.S. House of Representatives is set to vote on the same issue.
The U.S. House is set to vote on H.R. 984, which would effectively keep AFA and every other pro-family organization in America from providing you information on bills in Congress. Under H.R. 984, we would only be able to provide you information on a bill at a high cost and at great danger of being penalized by Congress.
To put it bluntly, members of Congress are tired of getting your e-mails and phone calls, and H.R. 984 is designed to keep information from you that might inspire you to call or write your representative.
The new Democratic Senate thinks that if it can keep you from getting information - which is what H.R. 984 would do - then its members will not be getting e-mails and phone calls from you.
Representatives favoring this bill are simply tired of hearing from you. That is the bottom line. They don’t want to hear from you. They don’t want you to be informed. They want to silence you. How? By simply keeping you from receiving information that AFA provides.
I know that language is strong, but H.R. 984 will do exactly what I’ve said.
Take Action
Send an e-mail to your representative now!
Call your representative at 202-224-3121. Urge your representative to vote against H.R. 984. Tell him or her that you support the portions of this bill that call for more transparency and accountability from Congress. Tell him or her that you reject provisions which unnecessarily require burdensome regulations upon communications by individual constituents who are freely and voluntarily expressing their views on important issues to members of Congress and the Executive Branch.
Please forward this to your friends and family. It is vitally important that they know what members of the House are trying to do.
Print this information, and share it with members in your Sunday School class and church and urge them to send an e-mail and call.
Email Your Representative in Opposition to H.R. 984
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Post by kevin1 on Apr 19, 2007 6:04:53 GMT -5
Whatever happend to the First Amendment?
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Post by bsutravis on Apr 19, 2007 7:25:14 GMT -5
Wow... I hadn't heard of this attempt to silence the voice OF THE PEOPLE.
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Post by Old Ironsights on Apr 19, 2007 9:25:45 GMT -5
I'm torn on this. It doesn't make political speech illegal, it simply revokes the Tax Exempt Status of organizations that insist on Political Speech/Activisim... Such Organizations include the Brady Bunch, the VPC and other noxious groups as well as Religious/"pro-family" organizations.
IMO if they want to be political, they should do as the NRA did... seperate their political arm (NRA-ILA) from their Not-For-Profit arm.
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Post by Russ Koon on Apr 19, 2007 11:20:44 GMT -5
What reason is there for Tax Exempy Status, for any organization?
It's just a way to make the rest of us pay the share of taxes that should have been paid by the donors to those organizations.
It makes us all unwilling, and usually unwitting, donors to every tax exempt organization, whether or not it's one we believe in or agree with.
We taxpayers are making up for the taxes that every donor who itemizes can write off of his taxable income for his donations to every tax-exempt organization, and that's almost all of them from the NRA to PETA, and from your church to the Satanic cults that are large enough and savvy enough to provide the tax dodge for their donors.
IMO, if you want to support an organization that believes as you do on any subject, feel free to do so....on your own dime. If you feel you just can't support them without forcing me to participate by replacing part of your taxes that would have been paid on the money you gave the organization, then maybe you should rethink your support level, and bring it down to the level you're comfortable in giving without my help.
Dropping the Tax Exempt Status for all organizations would probably result in lower donations to some, maybe to all. But at least then they'd be HONEST donations, not what they are now....a donation of so many dollars of the donor's money and some of every taxpayer's.
It would also result in a few less pages in the tax codes and a few less government snoopers prying into every detail of our lives, and a little less control by the feds.
Would it choke off the voice of the people? Of course not! It would merely make them pay for their own air time, and not make the rest of us help buy it.
Some smaller organizations would actually be much freer to express themselves. Many state organizations that are too small to have separate legislative wings are now constricted in what they can say that might be construed as political speech, out of fear that they may lose their Tax Exempt Status if they publicly speak their positions in plain talk.
Sounds to me like a step in the right direction.
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Post by Old Ironsights on Apr 19, 2007 11:25:43 GMT -5
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Post by JohnSmiles on Apr 19, 2007 19:30:21 GMT -5
If this would affect the Brady bunch and the other ANTI gun sections, then why are they not ALSO complaining and fighting this?  |
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Post by Old Ironsights on Apr 19, 2007 20:02:08 GMT -5
Because they are dumb?
Like Russ said, and I'm inclined to agree (at least to the extent this anarcho-capitalist is willing to accept any taxation whatsoever...) They are a business. I'm not willing to subsidize things I don't send money to directly. They should be taxed. And that includes Churches. Frankly, it m akes me sick to know that the Scientologists don't pay taxes.
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